Vel'Thara's new walls rose crooked and jagged. Stone welded to bone, glyphs sealed with ash, Ki-threads stitched into the foundation like scars. The academy wasn't healed. Not truly. But it breathed. Barely.
The air tasted of charred wood and iron, a lingering reminder of the siege. Dawnlight bled through the fractured sky, painting the rubble in hues of rust and gold. Raka stood at the southern watchtower, arms crossed, his silhouette sharp against the horizon. Ash clung to his boots, remnants of the bridge he'd crossed, and the ghost-glyphs beneath his skin pulsed faintly, like distant stars.
Lira watched him from the courtyard below, her gaze as unyielding as the glaive strapped to her back. She had seen too many warriors break under lesser burdens. This one, though, this stranger with fire in his veins and ash in his eyes. She could not yet name. Claire made no effort to hide her distrust, her fingers drumming the hilt of her dagger. "Flamebearer's fool," she muttered, though the title lacked its usual bite.
Tiv and Jace lingered at a safe distance, muttering over scrolls and suppression schematics. "The Seed's resonance is… fractal," Tiv whispered, adjusting his cracked spectacles. "It branches exponentially. If he fails"
"He won't," Jace interrupted, though his voice wavered. "The oath holds. It has to."
Only Kael moved freely around Raka, drawn by a recognition that defied words. They had not spoken of the bridge, of the pull that had drawn them together. There was no need. Some truths lived in silence.
In the depths beneath the academy, the Spiral Seed pulsed, a heartbeat muffled by stone. Its tendrils crept deeper, threading through the earth like roots seeking poisoned water.
The Judge summoned them to the half-ruined council chamber. The room smelled of damp stone and burnt herbs. Cracks spiderwebbed across the ceiling, and moonlight pooled in the hollow where the Shepherd's sigil had once blazed. Silver Lance Eirien, Master Selk, Kael, Claire, Lira, Sylva, Tiv, Jace, and Raka stood in a ragged circle. No banners adorned the cracked walls. No ceremony softened the air. Only purpose.
The Judge's voice rasped like wind over gravel. "You've seen the seed. It branches."
Kael nodded grimly. "Tiv confirmed it last night. It's not just growing, it's adapting."
"Like it's learning," Sylva added, her voice taut. "Learning how to survive us."
Eirien stepped forward, her armor clinking softly. "There's an option." Her gaze flicked to Kael, then Raka. "Someone with a stable Ki flame could carry the seed into exile. Somewhere Spiral resonance can't anchor. Somewhere it dies."
Claire stiffened. "That's not suppression. That's sacrifice."
"Yes," Eirien said, the word hanging like a blade.
The silence thickened, broken only by the drip of water seeping through the cracks.
Kael stepped forward. "I'll do it."
Claire seized his arm. "No." Her grip tightened, knuckles white. "You're the only thing holding this place together."
"You're too valuable here," Sylva snapped, her voice steel.
"We need you," Lira added, colder but no less firm.
The Judge said nothing. Only stared, his ruined eye glinting like fractured glass.
Then Raka spoke.
"I'll take it."
Heads turned. The air turned brittle.
Eirien frowned. "Why?"
Raka shrugged, the motion weary. "Because I'm already half-broken." His voice softened. "And because I'm searching for something… lost."
Kael studied him. The ghost-glyphs flickering under his skin, the ash clinging to his boots, the flame in his eyes that burned low but unyielding. There was no lie there. Only resolve.
The Judge leaned forward. "Will you bind yourself by oath?"
"I will."
The ritual began at dusk.
They gathered at the Spiral Seed's tomb, a cavernous chamber beneath the academy's roots. The air hummed with residual energy, and the walls wept thin trails of blackened resin.
Kael stood guard, his flame thrumming against the stone. It flickered erratically, as though the Seed's presence agitated it. Claire and Lira flanked the fissure, blades drawn. "If this goes wrong," Claire hissed to Lira, "you strike first."
Tiv and Jace anchored glyph stabilizers, their hands trembling. "Resonance at 78%," Tiv muttered. "Higher than projected"
"Stabilize the third quadrant!" Jace barked, sweat beading on his brow.
Sylva pressed her fingertips to the earth, tracking the Seed's pulse. "It's… singing," she whispered. "Like it knows what's coming."
Raka knelt before the stone, hands open, heart bare. The ghost-glyphs on his skin brightened, reacting to the Seed's call. He closed his eyes, and for a moment, the child's voice echoed again. "Papa, come on!" before dissolving into static.
The Judge's voice echoed in the hollow chamber:
"By ash and by oath, do you accept the burden?"
"I do."
"Will you carry it beyond flame, beyond memory?"
"I will."
"Will you bear it where we cannot follow?"
"I swear it."
The Spiral Seed answered.
It rose from the earth, a writhing knot of light and shadow, tendrils unfurling in slow, eerie grace. The chamber trembled. Stone cracked. Claire's daggers flared with defensive glyphs, and Lira's glaive hummed with restrained Ki. The Seed pulsed once, twice, then sank into Raka's chest.
He gasped, his back arching as ghost-glyphs seared across his skin. For a heartbeat, Kael saw the shadow of the Shepherd's spiral mask over his face. A fleeting echo of the man who had once sundered their world. Then—
Raka stood.
Still himself. Still burning. But brighter.
Afterward, they stood at the academy's gates.
Eirien clasped Kael's shoulder. "We'll hold here."
Raka smiled crookedly. "Wouldn't be the first time I walked alone."
Kael stepped forward, offering his hand. No words. No promises. Just respect.
Raka gripped it. Tight, fleeting. Then turned away. "Tell them," he said quietly, "that bridges can be rebuilt."
He did not wait for a reply.
Raka walked into the burning dawn, the Spiral Seed coiled within him, hope wrapped in ash. The ghost-glyphs on his skin dimmed with each step, as though the burden had already begun to hollow him.
Far beyond Vel'Thara's borders, through forgotten towns and rivers gone dry, a voice still called:
"Papa, come on!"
Raka smiled, weary but sure. "I'm coming," he whispered.
He did not look back.